Category: PR

Swedish health care company created fake Communications Officer profile

Vårdinnovation, a controversial Swedish health care company, created a fake Communications Officer because management didn’t want to be personally exposed in media. The company recently went bankrupt because of an alleged bribe scandal, created the profile Sara Johansson on LinkedIn with more than 500 contacts, for a press spokesperson that did not exist.

“Sara Johansson” only responded to media requests by email and has been quoted in several Swedish media in recent months. But she does not exist. Her profile picture on LinkedIn is most certainly created by an AI software like the one behind the site www.thispersondoesnotexist.com which creates realistic photos that look like a real person, but is not.

In an interview with SVT Skåne, Eliot Higgins, CEO at Bellingcat, a site for investigative journalism says that the image is most probably computer generated. The white background, the hair cut and the fact that she only has one earring are signs that the image is fake. A reverse Google image search produces no results. In a preliminary police investigation, Vårdinnovation’s CEO Damon Tojjar confirms that Sara Johansson “is a joint communication account that Vårdinnovation has so that they do not have to be exposed in the media themselves”.

Synthetic media and deep fakes

Synthetic media, or artificially produced media, will become more and more common, but this is the first instance we know of in Sweden where a spokesperson for a company simply was completely fake.

If you are interested in deep fakes and synthetic media, I strongly recommend these two podcasts:

Making Sense – The information apocalypse. Sam Harris meets author and journalist Nina Schick who writes a lot about AI.

Brave New Planet – Deep fakes and the future of truth. Podcast with Dr. Eric Lander, president and founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.

Champions League streaker Kinsey Wolanski’s Instagram suspended

Suspended

During last night’s Champions League final in Madrid between Liverpool and Tottenham, model Kinsey Sue Wolanski ran onto the pitch in a tiny swim suite. Wolanski is the girfriend of Russian born Youtuber and prankster Vitaly Zdorovetskiy, who has a history of streaking as well.

Kinsey Sue Instagram

Gained more than 2 million followers

Right before she ran onto the pitch in Madrid, Wolanski had 316,000 followers on Instagram. That has skyrocketed to about 2.5 million followers earlier today.

instagram_kinsey_sue_followers

Instagram is also full of copy cats who try to look like her account in order to gain followers. One of the fake accounts has grown from 73,000 to 114,000 followers in less than a day, so it pays off apparently.

Instagram has supspended Kinsey’s account

However, Kinsey Wolanski’s real Instagram account @kinsey_sue is nowhere to be found right now. A few hours ago, Vitaly posted a photo on his Instagram story where Kinsey says her account has been hacked.  More likely though is that her account has been suspended by Instagram, due to her sudden fame being a result of a criminal act.

account suspened on instagram

Footnote: I’m @kullin on Instagram.

 

Visa det här inlägget på Instagram

 

Ett inlägg delat av Hans Kullin ✈︎ (@kullin)

The end of a podcasting era

Here in Sweden, podcasts are getting more and more popular each day. Some of the most popular ones may have a hundred thousand listeners per episode or more. I’m not at all a heavy user but I discovered podcasts already 10 years ago and the one I started to listen to was For Immediate Release, The Hobson and Holtz Report by PR practitioners Neville Hobson and Shel Holtz.

FIR-Banner-design-2010

This podcast has been a tremendous resource on topics related to PR, social media and technology and I have been a regular listener since day one, with the exception of the last six months when I have not been as frequent.

Since the start they have produced an impressive 824 episodes of the highest quality. But this is the end of a podcasting era since Neville Hobson, which I have had the pleasure of meeting in person, has decided to call it a day to focus on other projects.

Shel Holtz will continue to run the podcast in a slightly new format on this new site. I would like to thank them both for the incredible amount of work they have put into this podcast over the years and best of luck for the future.

I will continue to follow FIR and I do recommend that you give it a try. To subscribe, just visit the subscribe page here.

Uber surge pricing during Sydney hostage crisis causes PR disaster

The week has barely started yet, but we can already crown the worst corporate tweet of the week. A crisis is taking place in Sydney, Australia as an armed man holds several people hostage in a Lindt café. The busy district is in a lock-down and mass evacuations created an increased demand for taxi services. So Uber, the taxi service app, quadrupled prices and at one point charged a minimum fare of AU$100. According to Quartz, this type of surge pricing is automatic but the tweet from @uber_sydney that followed was not.

uber_sydney_tweet

 

Of course, Uber was immediately slammed on Twitter for its cynic decision to charge a higher price during a crisis situation. Here are just a few reactions:

Uber soon had to backtrack to damage the PR disaster it had caused. A new tweet announced that rides out of Sydney now where free and that the company instead would refund passengers who had taken the expensive rides earlier this morning. A good move, but the damage to the company reputation had already been done.

uber_sydney_tweet2

 

Nissan’s brilliant Twitter response to #breaktheinternet

The web has been buzzing the last few days about Kim Kardashian’s rear end after it appeared on the cover of Paper magazine’s winter issue. Not surprisingly, some brands jumped on the bandwagon trying to not be left behind in the discussion. The practice of real-time marketing is a difficult one, but one brand that really got to the bottom of the issue sent out a tweet to end the discussion.

Here’s Nissan’s first Twitter rear-time marketing effort.

Touché Nissan, or should I say, tush?

Best social media responses to arrogant Layvin Kurzawa celebration

Last night, Sweden and France played the second leg of the play offs for the U21 European Championship in football. France had won the first leg 2-0 but now Sweden were heading towards the 2015 championships as they were up 3-0 at home. But in the last few minutes of the game, France scored the crucial 3-1 goal that would take them through. The goal scorer Layvin Kurzawa decided to celebrate the goal in the worst possible manner, running up the Swedish players like striker John Guidetti and mocking them with a gesture that said “see you later boys”.

kurzawaguidetti

But justice was served just a minute later when Sweden scored 4-1 on a corner, sending the Swedes to the UEFA Euro U-21s at the expence of the French team. Rarely has a footballer had to eat his own words sooner and the Swedes celebrated by getting back at Kurzawa with his own medicine.

JohnGuidetti

Througout most of the day, Twitter and other social media sites have been mocking Kurzawa for his bad behaviour and in particular for celebrating too soon.

In France, the hashtag #Kurzawa was even the number one trending topic today.

Here are a few of the best responses so far.

Class / no class:

Today is Didier Deschamps’ birthday. L’epique offers him a Layvin Kurzawa cap:

Laddar

#Bleuets#Kurzawa#football#Espoirs#Equipedefrance#Thauvin#Bahebeck#Euro2015#Qualifications#Psg#Om#Benzema#Chelsea

Visa på Instagram

And finally this one which is definitely NSFW: https://twitter.com/fc1932/status/522323254686797824